Williams says Washington hurts Wilmington's efforts to curb crime

Mayor Williams (WDEL/File)

The mayor of Wilmington is looking to Washington as partially to blame for the violence plaguing his city's streets.

Mayor Dennis Williams tells Delaware's Morning News that when controversies arise over the tracking of allies' phone calls, they take away from lawmakers's efforts here at home, like getting people back to work.

"This is what the problem is and mostly all the cities that have this violence, lack of educational programs...our educational system is failing our children...and these fools down there are just jumping around deciding who they're going to argue with about phone calls and other silly things. I'm just tired of it," he says.

Williams says another reason why the city may experience more shootings from time to time, actually has to do with police executing warrants and shutting down drug dealing operations in certain parts of Wilmington, which then try to re-establish in other areas of the city.

He says gangster mentality can turn a scenario like that into a turf war